


Letters to an Eagle

by Dorkangel



Category: The Eagle | The Eagle of the Ninth (2011)
Genre: During Canon, Gen, Humor, Letters, Missing Scene, Post canon, archeology
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-21
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-20 07:38:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1502162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dorkangel/pseuds/Dorkangel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Archeologists find and read some scrolls belonging to Marcus and Esca.<br/>Just some thoughts about the Eagle/Eagle of the Ninth :)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Letters to an Eagle

Letters to an Eagle

An Eagle of the Ninth fanfic.

In 2014 a team of archeologists discovered a group of perfectly preserved Roman scrolls in a box in Silchester.  
One of their number, a professor of Latin literature named Edward Arrowsmith, translated for them. 

*First Scroll*  
•One new knife. (Esca broke the last one)  
•Two new sets of clothes. Tunics and breeches, not a toga. I already have one  
•Another chicken  
•Bracelet for Cottia (And by Jupiter, don't tell her!)  
•New collar for Cub  
•Three sets of metal pipes-

*Real World*

The Latin professor sat back and laughed. It was a shopping list, and there were a few more items on it, but that could wait. Hopefully the next ones would be something a little more groundbreaking.

*Second Scroll*

I caught Esca staring down a wolf today. He just LOOKED at it, for ages, and then it ran away. Jupiter and Mithras! He is full of surprises. Cub himself, our own little wolf, seemed surprised to see one of his own kind. Cottia says that he thinks himself a lapdog, and that I should not cuddle him so.  
She is far more fierce than any wolf I have ever met. Esca says that among the Iceni, this is normal, and that she would only needed to have GLANCED at the wolf for it to have run home with it's tail between it's legs, and this I believe. She has been even fiercer since she fell pregnant: we will have a strong baby. If it is a boy with a spirit like Cottia's, I shall be frightened. If it is a girl with a spirit like Cottia's, Esca and I have agreed to run away and live in the mountains of Caledonia.

-Marcus Flavius Aquila.

*The Real World*

Edward smiled as he put this one down as well, though for a different reason. Marcus Flavius Aquila, it seemed, had married a British girl. One of the Iceni, like Boudicca.  
He owned a wolf cub too, and lived with someone named Esca. Who Esca was it remained to be seen. A Briton of some sort, definitely.  
And a man with a sense of humour.

*Third Scroll*

IX  
It is raining and I have been banned from going outside. Damn Uncle Aquila! Despite all his kindness, he is clearly evil. Locked up inside, I cannot move to exercise my leg, and will probably remain a cripple a good deal longer.  
This I cannot stand.  
Esca has gone and stood in the garden once or twice- he thinks I do not know, but I do not mind it. He is used to the rain after all, he grew up in Britain. I have a feel that it is painful for him to be so close to home, but be unable to run. He should have run, I told him so, and Uncle Aquila would not have stopped him, and he would be across Hadrian's Wall by now, not stuck here serving me.  
It is causing me headaches. HE is causing me headaches: he is so nervous. He keeps his head down, only ever raising it to argue with Marcipor. He was a gladiator, though clearly that's not all he was, or he would not be so afraid. I recognise his tattoos as Brigantes, and I know that there have never been fights with the Brigantes while I have been a Centurion. So he must have been captured a long time ago, and I hardly think he survived all that time as a gladiator, so he must have had other masters. Crueler ones than me and Aquila, though Gods know that isn't hard.

X  
My leg pained me so badly that I felt I had to go outside. Esca helped me, since I could barely move on my own at first. Cottia was not there, and doubtless when the rain ends she will come out, furious at her aunt and uncle for keeping her indoors and pretending she is Roman and calling her Camilla.

I have done something I regret. Esca was helping me and I snapped at him - the pain in my leg made me want to lash out - and he just held his gaze even lower and apologised until I had to order him to stop. I told him that it was not his fault and to stop asking forgiveness for my mistake, and THEN he looked up, taunt and tense as a bowstring, like he expected a trick, and the pride in his eyes was like a warning. He said when first we met that he hated me and everything I stand for, and he has not shown such courage since, but I know now, I think. He cannot like me, he cannot be friends with me. I am Roman, and Romans destroyed him. I asked him to sit down, for I would just be trying to hobble around on a broken and bloody mess of a leg, and he shook his head, and said quietly that he would catch me if I overdid it.  
I do not hate Esca, not at all, and I do not believe he hates me.  
Just what I stand for.

X11  
The rain stopped, thanks be to Neptune, and-

*Real life*  
The scroll ended there, cut roughly off. This seemed to have happened quite some time before the other scroll.  
He jotted down a few more notes on his pad. Marcus had been a Centurion. He was injured, a bad leg wound. Esca had been a gladiator. Cottia lived next door, and her family wished her to act more Roman. Esca was Brigantes and he hated Rome. Marcus lived with his uncle, who was named Aquila. Esca was Marcus's slave.  
This was becoming more and more intriguing...

*Fourth Scroll*

Marcus Flavius Aquila,  
My Latin is terrible. My Latin writing is worse, and I apologise. I would like to write this down for you though.  
You saved my life, gave me another chance. One I did not want. I was quite prepared to die, and I threw my weapons down in an attempt to show it. I did not ask for mercy and I expected none, and shame as it was to die for the entertainment if Roman idiots (not you), it would be worse to kill for the entertainment of Roman idiots (still not you).  
When they pulled me to my feet after you saved me, I was thrown into a cell by the circus master, who was understandably angry that I had refused to fight.  
If your Uncle Aquila had not bought me, he would have attempted to feed me to the wolves. I laughed at this, because I had fed the wolves half of my food every day and they trusted me, and if he tried to make them fight me I would have sat down as a friend among them, and he would have to kill me himself, the coward.  
But your Uncle Aquila did buy me. He came when I was talking to the wolves: I must admit, I was afraid of a death at their teeth, and I wished to calm them if I could. The circus master, Beppo, pulled me to my feet and pushed me roughly towards Aquila. I did not trust him, and he began to question me. "You speak Latin?"  
"Yes."  
"You have had other masters?"  
"Yes."  
"How old are you?"  
"Nineteen. I think."  
"What is your name?"  
"Esca."  
"What do you know of medicines?"  
"Enough. I can heal a battle wound."  
At this he paused, and I was angry that I had given away more than one word about myself. That had not been my intention.  
Then he turned and asked Beppo for a price. I had not realised he intended to buy me, but I guess maybe that was foolish.  
He led me out, and I trailed just a few steps behind him. I laugh to think that the second he had rounded the corner and I had not, I turned and made a gesture that the gladiators had taught me at the circus master, and he went red with rage.  
The second I walked out into the square I considered running. I knew that an old man could not stop me, and I would have run if not for what he said. He told me that I was a gift for his nephew, who was injured, badly.  
And then he said that you were the boy who saved my life, and so I did not run.  
I hated you for the gift of my life, and I hated that I owed you it, and most of all I hated your Roman-ness that was so close to my Britain.  
A wall can not hold out Britain.  
However, I have never hated you. And I am glad you freed me (though at first it was another thing I owed you) and I am glad to be here in Cavella with Cottia and you and Cub and your son.

-Esca Mac Cunoval

*Real life*  
Edward put this scroll down. He picked up his pen to make a note, and did not. This Esca had lived a hard life, by the sound of it. He was glad that he had found Marcus... He was feeling emotions for a boy dead nearly 1900 years!  
He took some notes on his pad and picked up the final scroll, which by the look of it, was nothing more than loose scraps of parchment rolled up in a bigger piece.

*Fifth Scroll*

Manumission papers for Esca, son of Cunoval, body slave to Marcus Flavius Aquila. The main concern of...

...A military armilla, for conspicuous gallantry...

...the Eagle of the Ninth Legion of Gauls, recovered by Marcus Flavous Aquila and Esca Mac Cunoval, shall be buried at the crossroads in Cavella...

Dear Uncle Aquila,  
I hope you are not too lonely, and if you are, I beg you to visit us! Cottia has gone back to her natural ways at scowling at anything Roman, including me if I annoy her and Cub has caught two rabbits and a deer. Everyone is going feral, I think, though you have always said Esca was always wild...

*Real Life*

And then it ended. The professor made only two more notes.  
Marcus = special award for courage.   
EAGLE OF NINTH. Must investigate further.

He had read many such things in his life. But somehow Marcus's and Esca's case touched him. It was not only the Eagle that he would be compelled to investigate further.


End file.
